Lawsagna

Guest Post by Kat Sanders: 5 Reasons to Adopt Technology in Law Firms

This article is written by Kat Sanders, who regularly blogs on the topic of court reporter school online at her blog Court Reporter Schools.  She welcomes your comments and questions at her email address: [email protected].

Technology is relatively a baby when we take into account that there wasn't much of it around 25 years ago. But, its growth has been explosive, especially over the last decade. Technology has advanced in rapid leaps and bounds and has overtaken most of us; even the ones who were fast enough to have kept up are constantly buried in an avalanche of innovations and inventions, each more sophisticated than its predecessor.

We now live in a world of gadgets; we live virtually inside the Internet; and we are so dependent on technology that most of us have forgotten the world that existed before the machines took over. Legal offices, especially the ones that were established more than 30 years ago and are still plodding along with respectability and pride in their heritage, are at times hesitant to embrace technology with open arms. In fact, while some firms take to it like a fish to water, others are wary and tread water carefully before being assured that they can manage the new gizmos and software.

But there's the third kind that sticks to their roots and tries to just ignore technology and sweep it under the carpet. If you're an attorney and find yourself technologically challenged, here's why you must effect some positive changes at your firm:

• Technology improves productivity: With machines being programmed to take care of routine tasks, your staff is free to handle matters that are of higher importance. When you're able to delegate chores that are drudgery but which have to be done anyway to technology, you find that you have more time on your hands and more patience to handle cases that deserve more of your attention.
• Technology cuts costs: In the long run, you will save money when you invest in technology today. You can run your office with fewer staff members and also boost efficiency if you use the technology correctly and in the right manner.
• Technology makes your job easier: Whether you're arguing a case in court or just preparing a deposition, technology makes your job much easier. It also allows you to try your cases with a visual aspect and permits documents to be searched and sorted easily.
• Technology impresses clients: When the rest of the world has embraced it, if you lag behind, clients are not going to be impressed enough to walk into your office. Once they realize that you are keeping up with the times and utilizing all the ammunition that's available to fight your cases, they tend to have more confidence in your abilities.
• Technology is here to stay: It's as simple as that; if you don't take to technology today, you're going to find yourself outdated and irrelevant in a very short time. So don't put off the inevitable, and embrace innovation today.

I am on Twitter

I finally joined the Twitter community.  You can follow me at http://twitter.com/Lawsagna.

As I am learning about Twitter, I thought I’d share a few links I found useful:

"How Twitter Can Help at Work" by Sarah Milstein in the Shifting Careers column of The New York Times

"Twitter for Beginners - 5 Things to Do as a New Twitter User" at Problogger

"50 Ideas on Using Twitter for Business" by Chris Brogan

"Twitter for Business Reading List" at Pistachio

Twitter Social Brand Index

A list of lawyers and legal professionals on Twitter compiled by Adrian Larssen and the update post (hat tip to Build A Solo Practice, LLC)

iTweetNet.com  -     Interface for Twitter:

•     Built-in auto-refresh, search and hashtags;
•     Full follow, block, notifications features;
•     View user bio, location, URL inline with tweets;
•     Watch conversations with "in reply to" links.

Do you have any links you like?

Wordle

This is a visual representation of Lawsagna created in Wordle.  Worlde is an application that creates word clouds from text that you provide.  You can enter text, submit a URL of your blog, or a del.icio.us user name to see the tags.  You can choose different fonts, layouts, and color schemes for your image.  It’s a neat tool to play with. 

Top 100 Tools for Learning

Jane Hart at the Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies is compiling the Top 100 Tools for Learning 2008 list by asking learning professionals to contribute their lists of top 10 favorite tools for learning.  If you want to know more about Web 2.0 technologies and social learning, the Centre is an excellent place to start.  I've written about the Directory of Learning Tools, which now contains over 2,000 production and personal tools for learning. You can also check out 25 must-have free tools for professional development. And here’s the link to my top 10 learning tools. 

TimeLeft for time management

TimeLeft is a multipurpose time-management tool that can notify you of an upcoming event, count down till your next scheduled study or work break, measure time interval and signal its end, even track online auctions.  The program can can also replace Windows' built-in system-tray clock.

"TimeLeft is a versatile desktop utility, which may be used as a countdown clock, reminder, clock, alarm clock, tray clock, stopwatch, timer, sticker, auction watch and time synchronization utility. TimeLeft uses Winamp skins to show digits and text.

The main feature of TimeLeft is a powerful customizable reminder, which can show a message, play music (any formats including mp3) or open a link, document, execute an application, turn off your monitor or shutdown your PC."

A website where mentors and mentees meet

iMantri is a new social networking site for people who offer and seek mentoring:

"Whether you want to be a mentor or a mentee, iMantri allows you evaluate your competencies, help find a suitable mentoring match, provides a framework and facilitates mentoring interactions."

I am about to explore this site more.  Shifting Careers has a nice review of this application.  (Here's the link to my post on "How to find a mentor.") I think Web 2.0 has a great potential to foster mentoring relationships.  What do you think?  Can you see a social networking site as a platform for lawyers to seek and offer mentoring?  What are the advantages and disadvantages of this high-tech approach?  I'd love to read what you think.   

   

Professor Matthew Bodie looks into the future of the casebook

What would a law school casebook of the future look like?  Professor Matthew Bodie’s article "The Future of the Casebook: An Argument for an Open-Source Approach," published in the Journal of Legal Studies, discusses the possibilities for creating a digital casebook as an open-source project. (Hat tip to video visi visum).

Abstract:      
Despite dramatic technological change, the thick, attractively bound casebook remains ensconced as the written centerpiece of legal education. That will soon change - but its replacement has not been established. This paper argues that the legal academy should take this opportunity to implement an open source approach to future course materials. Guided by analysis and examples of commons-based peer production such as open source software, professors could establish electronic commons casebooks with a myriad of materials for every course. These joint databases would unshackle individual creativity while engendering collaboration on levels previously impossible. Although there may be concerns that such a project would not draw any interest, or might be swamped by too much interest, the successes of other peer-production projects demonstrate that such concerns are generally unwarranted or manageable. Copyright ultimately poses the biggest difficulty, but even that barrier can be circumvented to greater and lesser degrees. Although as yet an untried experiment, an open source approach has the potential to open a new era in legal pedagogy.

If you let your imagination run free, what opportunities do you see for a future casebook?  Perhaps, audio files of cases, possibility to search related materials with keywords and tags, templates for case notes, briefs and outlines, collaborative legal wikis?  Nothing heavy to haul around, please...  Everything available at a click of a button, including virtual chats with your professor during office hours.

 

Free download of EverNote at Giveaway of the Day

For all note-takers out there, Giveaway of the Day offers a free download of EverNote:

EverNote allows you to easily capture any information you like, and find it whenever you want. Create text or handwritten notes, import mobile phone snapshots, clip web pages, and grab content from any application directly into EverNote - so everything is kept in a single place.

Once your data is in EverNote, find it quickly using our advanced search, automatic and custom categories, and intuitive interface.

EverNote innovates by storing content on an endless, virtual roll of paper. You can quickly scroll chronologically through your notes similar to scanning through handwritten notes in a notebook.

The free download is only available today, so hurry up if you want it. 

"Let's Say Thanks" website

As we remember and honor our veterans today, we may also want to extend our appreciation to soldiers serving overseas this holiday season.  "Let's Say Thanks" website, sponsored by Xerox, allows you to choose a free personalized postcard that will be then printed and sent to U.S. military personnel stationed overseas.  The postcards are designed by children across the country.  (Hat tip to Build A Solo Practice, LLC).

Learning Incubator

• Are you a knowledge worker whose livelihood depends on how quickly and accurately you process information each day?
• Are you a life-long learner with the passion and curiosity for knowledge who wants to use this knowledge for impact?

Pull up a chair, get your cup of coffee (or tea) and join our conversation about informal learning and professional development.

Think how rapidly things change nowadays.  Successful knowledge workers have the skills to learn fast, think clearly and act decisively.  They don’t feel overwhelmed with information because they know what to look for and how to find and prioritize it.  Yet, many of us would probably agree that we have very little time to work on the skills we need to learn better.  Here’s an idea.  Let’s have a conversation about our informal learning and professional development.  How do we learn?  What works and what doesn’t?  How can we maximize our learning “on the job” – by doing what we already do anyways, but perhaps with better approaches, frameworks, and focus?   

Are you ready to take charge of your learning?   Join our Learning Incubator community to share your learning goals, achievements and tips for success, to inspire and get inspired to be the best learner you can be.  Bring curiosity, humor, respect, and appreciation – that’s how we learn best.  The membership is free.  What’s there to lose, except a good conversation?

Gone Fishing

I am on vacation this week, so I won’t be able to post as frequently.   To make sure you  have enough to read (I know…couldn’t resist), here are a few links to various resources on learning skills.

How to manage time better:
Time Management Pretest:  How Efficiently Do I Manage My Time?
Time management tips and resources from Academic Skills Center at Dartmouth College
Time Management Schedules to download form Academic Skills Center at CalPoly
21 Ways to Add More Hours to the Day at Lifehack.org

How to process information better:
10 Essential Mind Mapping Links at Codswallop
Improving Note Taking with Concept Maps at Mind Tools
Memory Principles:  Quick Reference Guide for Brain Compatible Learning Principles

What resources help you study better?

A new networking site for attorneys

ABA Journal reports on the launch of a new social networking site for attorneys called LawLink.   It is a network exclusively for licensed attorneys, who can join free of charge.  The application form will ask for your bar number, and the applications are checked.  LawLink provides the following services: 

The Network: Acquire new clients, advance your career, build a network of trusted attorneys.

The Classifieds: Jobs, client referrals, atty to atty services, office space, announcements, personals and more.

The Forum: Discuss legal topics, share info with other attys working on similar matters, and discuss judges, experts and other attys.

The Brochure: Create a brochure with your bio, qualifications, colleagues, endorsements and photos.

World Legal Information Institute

If you are interested in international and comparative law, check out the website of World Legal Information Institute:  “Free, independent and non-profit access to worldwide law.”  It provides free access to public legal information form all over the world.  You can search legal resources in 865 databases from 123 countries and territories.

TagCrowd

TagCrowd is a visualization tool that creates tag clouds based on the text you provide by either pasting or typing it, or uploading as a file up to 100 KB.  It was created by Daniel Steinbock, a doctoral student in Design and Education at Stanford University. 

Here’s one possible use for it.  Before reading an article, you can run it through TagCrowd to get a visual preview of what it is going to cover.  I did that with my yesterday’s post, and here’s what I got:

accomplish becoming better control cost decide goals learner learning month motivating objectives orientation paper periods personal program progress setting significant something steps track ve work

created at TagCrowd.com

A useful technology law resource

I’ve recently come across a useful website dedicated to technology law - BitLaw: 

"BitLaw is a comprehensive Internet resource on technology law, containing over 1,800 pages on patent, copyright, trademark, and Internet legal issues."

BitLaw is provided by the Minneapolis law firm of Beck & Tysver.  I like how the website is organized:  it has executive summaries, multiple categories for information, good lists of resources, helpful navigation.  Technology law can be quite confusing, so clear presentation is a plus.  Check it out.

Take the Working Memory Challenge

About Working Memory is a web site that provides information and resources about working memory, just like its title suggests.  The term “working memory” refers to our ability to hold information in memory temporarily (for a few seconds) while we are solving a problem or performing a task.  The site has a challenge that allows you to test your working memory capacity.  You do two exercises with progressively increasing levels of difficulty.  The first exercise tests your ability to remember visual patterns.  The second exercise focuses on the auditory information.  Once you are done, you can compare your score with other people’s scores on similar working memory exercises.  Are you ready to push your working memory to the limits?

Take the Six Seconds emotional intelligence test SEI-360 free of charge

Six Seconds is a not-for-profit organization that offers information, tools, and services related to emotional intelligence:

“Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize, understand, and manage feelings. It is the key competency for personal effectiveness, essential to communication, self-direction, problem-solving, and leadership.”

During the month of July, you can participate in the free trial of the Six Seconds emotional intelligence assessment SEI-360.  The SEI-360 is an online test that measures how you use your emotional intelligence in your daily life and how other people, who you choose to give you feedback, perceive your emotional intelligence skills.

It sounds like a great way to learn more about yourself.  Hurry up because the test is available free of charge as a research version only till the end of July.

Tip bit #27: On memory collages

If you need to memorize a complex concept, try creating a memory collage.  Here’s how  it works.  Pick the key elements and relationships that describe the concept.  Then, find images that you associate with those elements.  You can browse magazines if you want to make it low tech or find images on the web if you want to create your collage in a digital format, or maybe, you can sketch them yourself.  After you are done collecting your visuals, arrange them in a collage trying to reflect the relationships among the underlying elements.  The benefit of a memory collage is that it allows you to see the concept as a whole whereas the verbal description can only be sequential. 

Visit Creativity Portal to explore various collage resources on the internet or play with Art Zone interactive tools to create your own collage online. 

Tip Bit #25: Make a list of 5 things that you are excited about

If you need inspiration in your life, check out Pursue the Passion.  Here’s what the creators of the project say about it:

“Pursue the Passion started as a group of three recent college grads who embarked on cross country roadtrips to interview passionate professionals about their career paths. We created this site because we felt that others could benefit from these interviews, and use them to determine a direction to take their careers.”

In addition to great stories, I really like their series “5 Things I’m Excited About on a Friday.”   I think it’s a great way to fuel your passion and remind yourself how exciting you life is.  We all need it from time to time, and Friday just seems like a perfect day for this type of exercise.  The weekend is almost here, so dream a little, let your curiosity run free and find excitement in your life.  What are the 5 things you are excited about this Friday?   I’ll start:

1. I am so excited that I am close to launching my online training course.  It’s going to happen very soon (more on it later).
2. I am excited that the weather is promising to be wonderful this weekend, which means I get to spend more time outdoors, and I like that.
3. I am excited to start reading “The Art of the Start” by Guy Kawasaki that I just got from the library. 
4. I am excited my daughter learned how to stack building blocks.  She was really good at smashing my creations before, but now she can build tall towers on her own.  Silly things can make Mommy happy. 
5. I am excited about my exercise and meditation routine.  I hope I can stick to it.  I want to be able to meditate properly for at least 20 minutes.  Right now, my mind is still dashing from thought to thought and my back starts aching after sitting still for about 10 minutes.  It will get better, right?  Practice, practice, practice.   

Who is next? 

Pure Text

PureText is a neat little tool that allows you to paste text to any application without the original formatting.  After you install PureText (it’s free), you can use its Windows hot-key to paste the text instead of the standard Ctrl-V hot-key.  Alternatively, you can click on the "PT" tray icon near the clock on your task bar to remove formatting from the text that is currently on the clipboard.  Easy and useful.  (Hat tip to Success from the Nest).

National Pro Bono Opportunities Guide

Looking for opportunities to do good and gain legal experience?  Look no further than the National Pro Bono Opportunities Guide, a project jointly sponsored by the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Pro Bono and Public Service, the ABA Center for Pro Bono and Pro Bono Net.

The Guide lists various programs across the United States that need volunteer legal professionals. After you choose the state that interests you, you will be taken to the listing of the programs in that state.  The directory offers additional filters to narrow your search options by county, area of law, the population groups served and the volunteers’ desired level of experience. The last filter allows you to search projects for law students, transactional lawyers, mentors, paralegals and others.  You can also search by keywords. 

Research resources for summer associates

It’s not all play for summer associates, after all. You will have to do some work, such as research and writing.  Here are a few sites to bookmark that will help you develop your research strategy.

LawyerExpress, “designed by a busy lawyer for busy lawyers,” brings you a lot of information in a convenient and customizable format:  Here’s how they define their objective:

“Our primary goal at LawyerExpress is to make the Internet worth your while. Toward that end, we've developed great tools to find the "20%" that would be valuable to attorneys. LawyerExpress transforms what can be an inefficient, unruly morass of information into a format that works smarter and faster for busy people.” 

Georgetown Law Library connects summer associates to various legal resources.  Check out their State Research Guides and Online Tutorials, covering research in statutes, cases, administrative law, secondary sources, and other areas.

Finally, here are tips on summer associate research strategies from the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Law Library.

The Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania

If you want to be successful, you need to know how to leverage your strengths.  Peter Drucker said: "Most people think they know what they are good at. They are usually wrong." A good place to start exploring your talents is the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania:

“Positive Psychology is the scientific study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive. The Positive Psychology Center promotes research, training, education, and the dissemination of Positive Psychology. This field is founded on the belief that people want to lead meaningful and fulfilling lives, to cultivate what is best within themselves, and to enhance their experiences of love, work, and play.”

The Center offers a variety of scientifically tested questionnaires and surveys, including their VIA Signature Strengths Questionnaire that measures 24 character strengths.  The tests are free, but you need to register.  While you are there, check out their newsletters on Authentic Happiness and the list of resources – that’s how I found out about the BBC series "The Happiness Formula."

Tip Bit #19: On art appreciation

It’s Friday.  Maybe, you have just finished your finals and feel tired and a bit empty inside, or perhaps, your exams are not over yet and you have to push yourself to study some more.  Here’s a tip to lift your spirit, reignite your imagination and have some fun without leaving your home.  Visit a virtual art gallery.  You can find a lot of great artists from all over the world on the internet these days.  With a bit of imagination, you can transport yourself to some wonderful places:

Enter a whimsical world of figurative sculptures and art dolls at Art Propensity created by Patricia Anders. 

Pretend you are in a nineteenth century living room of an animal lover and enjoy the portraits of dogs at the William Secord Gallery (I had pleasure to visit the gallery in person – I know one of the dogs in this painting).

Tour isolated villages of the Sierra Madres in Jalisco, Maxico through the works of my artist friend Gene Romero. He has just recently gone virtual!

In mood for some landscapes?  Yuriy Kirsanov, whose photo I chose for this post, will take you to Russia’s countryside.   If you like photography, also check out images at iStockphoto. 

Get inspired by the winners of the Website Design Awards and the 2007 Winter Semi Annual Contest winners of the American Design Awards.

Look under your feet!  You can find amazing pavement drawings by Julian Beever.

Where do you go for art?

Legal research resources

The ABA Legal Technology Resource Center created The Legal Research Jumpstation with links to various legal resources under categories such as federal resources, state resources, international resources, legal associations, legal education, legal employment, Continuing Legal Education (CLE), law practice technology, ethics, legal representation, future of the legal profession, surveys and statistics, legal news sources, legal research resources, business and reference resources, electronic discovery resources. 

For example, you can visit the sites of the State and Local Bar Associations, check out various statistics about lawyers and the legal profession, read employment trend data compiled by the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), find the wealth of information at the Legal Information Institute hosted by Cornell University's School of Law, search online law journals courtesy of the University Law Review Project, or browse through The Virtual Law Library hosted by the University of Indiana's School of Law. [Via Your ABA]

On visual thinking and optical illusions

Do you want to develop your spatial intelligence and learn to think visually?  How about attending Visual thinking school?  It’s free, there is no formal enrollment or registration, and you don’t even need to leave your desk to do it.  This online curriculum, developed by Dave Gray,  includes mini-course modules such as Introduction to visual thinking, Visual communication, Visual vocabulary, Visual thinking tools, Visual thinking spaces, Sketching, Sings, symbols and icons, Information design, Visual mapping:

"This site is different every time you visit: it's continuously updated via live feeds from the web to bring you the best and most delicious images and links available: visuals to inspire, examples to follow, books to read and things to do, designed to stimulate your imagination and visual thinking." 

Need a break?  Check out 71 Optical Illusions by Michael Bach.  They are very intriguing. 

E-Guide To Public Service at America's Law Schools

Equal Justice Works and Newsweek.com released the E-Guide to Public Service at America's Law Schools:

The E-Guide to Public Service at America's Law Schools is a free interactive online resource that provides a broad range of information about public interest programs and curricula at 116 law schools. Equal Justice Works, a Washington-based nonprofit public interest law organization, created The E-Guide to fill the void in existing commercial publications by providing information about public service in law schools and about factors many consider essential to a quality legal education.

You can read the rest of the press release here.  Newsweek.com hosts the E-Guide. 

On books, papers and citations

Do you know what book holds the record of being the longest book ever written in the world?  It is Yongle Dadian - "The Encyclopedia of Yongle Emperor's Reign in Ming Dynasty.”  It took 4 years for 3,000 scholars to finish the compilation of 11,095 volumes and 22,877 chapters in 1408.  The encyclopedia has an estimated 370 million Chinese characters. 

As to much shorter but surely no less important Bluebook, check out "Introduction to Basic Legal Citation" by Peter W. Martin.  It has good information on legal citation, which you may want to read if your goal is to join a law review or write for one.

If you want to streamline your legal research and writing, CiteIt! may be the right choice for you.   It is a software that automatically formats legal citations according to The Bluebook or The ALWD Citation Manual, inserts properly-formatted citations into your word-processing document, creates a table of authorities and makes it easy for you to store, search and organize your legal research.  You can download a free trial version.
   
If you must write a research paper for any course or journal that uses MLA, APA or Chicago style, Slate Citation Machine is a free simple-to-use online citation tool to reformat a citation to the style you need.

Finally, here is a good compilation of resources for writing a research paper from St. Ambrose University Library.  This is how I found the Thinking Page, which offers information on improving organizational and individual thinking. 

Citegraph

Citegraph is a tool that visually represents the connections between your legal search results.  The database currently includes a little over 3000 U.S. Supreme Court and federal circuit cases, with more cases added each day.  Once you enter a search term, Citegraph retrieves all the matching cases.  The cases are displayed as circles, and the lines between the cases are citations from one case to another. The case circles differ in their size and color depending on the number of citations to those cases in your search results. Mouse over a circle to highlight all the connected cases and display the case name.  Click on the circle to lock the highlighted area.  The Help section of the website describes additional functions.  The visual representation allows you to see the relative importance of various cases to your legal research.

Tips and tools for your job search and career development

Are you looking for a summer internship or a job?  Do you contemplate a career transition?  If so, here is a round-up of some tips and tools that can help you in the process. 

Each of you has had a variety of experiences in you life that have helped you to develop certain skills that are valuable to your potential employer.  But when time comes to prepare your resume or answer questions at a job interview, you may not remember this valuable information.   This inventory list will ensure you give yourself credit for all the wonderful things you have accomplished in life.   It has two parts:  Part I discusses “Sources of Evidence That You May Possess Skills, Experiences, and Attributes of Interest to Employers” and Part II lists “Skills, Experiences, and Attributes You Have That Might Be of Interest to Employers.”   It’s a good check list to go through and make sure you are not forgetting anything important.  And you may be surprised at how much you already know.  Also, if you need to add some action to your resume, check out Bloom’s Taxonomy Verbs. 

Do you need help with job interviews?  Lifehack discusses a new tool – InterviewTrue -  which allows you to practice your interviewing skills virtually. You can customize your interview by choosing from the database of 1000 questions from the leading companies.  You record yourself with your own webcam as a virtual interviewer asks you questions.  After the interviewing session is over, you receive a transcript of your interview.  You can watch the recording to evaluate your body language and analyze your responses in a transcript.  The InterviewTrue site has a demo and a free trial option. 

Here’s another interesting way to play out your interview scenario.  It comes from the area of the Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP).  As you do the exercise, you visualize the desired behavior and build confidence. 

As you network for success, don’t make The Ten Biggest Networking Mistakes, described by Harvey Mackay.  Instead, focus on developing the Seven Habits of Successful Rainmakers, shared by Sara Holtz in The Complete Lawyer.    

If you aspire to build a solo practice, Build A Solo Practice blog by Susan Cartier Liebel will guide you in the right direction. 

Perhaps, you want personalized advice in exploring various career options.  If so, visit Life at the Bar blog by Julie Fleming-Brown, a professional and personal coach for lawyers.

Related posts:
5 questions to ask when you evaluate job options
Find out your networking quotient

Have fun with words

I’ve been playing with words this morning.  My linguistic background is to blame.  If you want to join in the fun, I am willing to share a few links.

“Wordy” Sites:

alphaDictionary.com.  Warning: don’t go there unless you have a strong willpower or nothing to do.  You will get happily lost among pages and pages of information – some serious, some fun. You can practice International Tongue Twisters, check out the Glossary of Useless Latin Phrases or a list of more than 250 words that speakers and writers of English often confuse (false cognates). 
The following entry is from The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce (1911):

LAW, n.
Once Law was sitting on the bench,
And Mercy knelt a-weeping.
"Clear out!" he cried,"disordered wench!
Nor come before me creeping.
Upon your knees if you appear,
'Tis plain your have no standing here."
Then Justice came. His Honor cried:
"Your status?—devil seize you!"
"Amica curiae," she replied—
"Friend of the court, so please you."
"Begone!" he shouted—"there's the door—
I never saw your face before!"
      —G. J.

The Word Detective.  This is an online version of a newspaper column that answers readers’ questions about words and language.  It is informative and humorous at the same time. 

Grammar Girl’s Quick & Dirty Tips for Better Writing.  It is a free podcast.  Five minutes of grammar a day keeps grammar snobs away.  (Actually, the podcast is about once a week.)

Dictionaries:

OneLook dictionary.  I like its reverse dictionary feature.  If you describe a concept in a few words, a sentence, or a question, you will receive a list of related terms.  Using this feature, you can even cheat on crossword puzzles by typing in some letters and wildcards.

Multilingual Legal Glossary from Vancouver Community College.  You enter an English term, choose a target language and get the equivalent term in that language with the plain language definition and a list of related words.  The languages offered are Chinese (Simplified), Farsi, Punjabi, Russian, Spanish, Vietnamese.   

An English Pronouncing Dictionary with Instant Sound.  You enter a word and listen to its proper pronunciation. 

The Visual Thesaurus.  It is an interactive dictionary and thesaurus. You type in a word and get a visual representation of related words and concepts.  Roll over a term on the word map to see its definition and examples of usage.  You can also listen to an American or British pronunciation of a word.  You can try a few words for free but to use it continuously, you need to buy the program or subscribe to the service.

Pseudodictionary.  A dictionary of words that can’t make it to other dictionaries yet: concocted words, slang, web-speak, colloquialisms.  Try typing in the word “law” and see what comes up.   

The Ridiculous Business Jargon Dictionary.   This one is a dictionary of business jargon that you don’t want to use.

A list of law-related dictionaries at alphaDictionary.com.  It offers brief descriptions and links to various online dictionaries, such as Plain English Dictionary or Legal Terms or Harvard Law School One-L Dictionary.

Generators of silliness:

Official Seal Generator.  This site will help you generate an official seal, like the one you see in this post. 

The Advertising Slogan Generator.   “The Law is Mightier than the Sword.” That’s what I got when I typed in “law.”   

Post-It Note Generator.   As the name suggests, it generates post-it notes when you enter the text.

Buzzomatic Memo Writer from alphaDictionary.  If you don't like to write, let your computer do it for you.  You will create some buzz. 

Image Chef.  You choose a template, enter your message and get a customized image.

OK… enough of fun.  It’s time to go about my serious business. 

Directory of Free E-Learning Tools

I’ve recently come across the Directory of Free E-Learning Tools created and constantly updated by Jane Hart, Learning & Performance Technologist.  It is a great resource for anybody who likes to use technology in training and learning.  As of this writing, it lists 581 free tools across various categories, such as Document tools, Web page, blogging & wiki tools, Interactive Content tools, Communication tools, Resource sharing tools, Course, Content & Community tools, Personal tools.  Each of these larger categories is subdivided into subcategories that are self-descriptive and easy to search.  They cover anything from personal productivity to presentations, note-taking, blogging, widgets and accessories for blogs and web pages.   The Directory also provides an alphabetical listing of tools.  Each tool has a brief description of its main functions and availability with the link to the product provider.  I like how this site is organized.  It is very informative and easy to navigate.  Plus, you can subscribe to the updates via news feeds.  Check it out. 

Tip bit #2: presentation

"Tell me and I will forget. Show me and I will remember. Involve me and I will understand."
Confucius

If you need to make a presentation to your class or your client, make it visual and make it interactive.  If you are not sure how to visualize your data, check out A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods.   The table is color-coded for six categories:  data visualization, information visualization, concept visualization, strategy visualization, metaphor visualization and compound visualization.  It’s fun to poke around. 

Tip bit #1: preserving knowledge

How good are you at keeping safe what you have?  Another semester is just around  the corner, and soon you will start new briefs, outlines, papers.  In this digital age, most of our valuable knowledge is just some invisible magnetic dust on our computer.  Are you protected against data loss?  You have probably heard or lived through the horror stories of computer crashes, and you back up your work regularly.  If not, you should read The Tao of Backup.  Even if you know everything there is to know about backup, you can read it anyways because it’s funny. 

In a not-so-funny scenario of a computer crash, do you know what to do or not to do?  This article talks about why you should not commit violence against your computer even when you see you data “sleeping away into a black hole.”

What experts suggest you should read

Some of you may be already heading to your winter break.  Perhaps, you are wondering what to read.  If that’s the case, check out Suggestica that offers recommendations of books, audio and video from the leading experts in various fields. You can browse the lists of experts and their suggestions by subject matter categories.

I found out about this service through Keith Ferrazzi’s blog. I’ve recently read his book Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success One Relationship at a Time and thoroughly enjoyed it.  It’s a great read, full of tips, personal stories and anecdotes from the lives of the famous “connectors.”  It’s not just another book about networking.  It’s about an approach to building your personal and business relationships for life.  It’s about spreading an authentic and consistent message about your brand, who you are and what you stand for.  If you are interested in the ways to manage the “know-who” of your personal knowledge management system, you will probably find this book useful. This is my non-expert recommendation.   

A few notes on note-taking

I wish my office clutter would disappear with the same consistency as my post- it notes do.  Seriously, how often do you lose your notes?  Have you ever lost phone numbers, to-do lists, brainstormed ideas?   I sure have.  Even my grocery lists vanish in my purse with alarming frequency.  And what do you do with those passwords that some sites create for you to use and don’t let you change them?  So, I’ve decided to learn more about different ways to take notes and, hopefully, keep them.  Here are a few ideas and resources on the subject of note-taking:

3"x5" index cards.  I get them in different colors for various categories of notes.  I use them to create a bank of interesting ideas for my future projects.  I keep all my cards in a simple plastic card file.  If I need an idea to work on, I flip through the cards.   This system can also be used to create flashcards and mnemonics for studying.  It’s portable and easy to use.

Dream boards.  A dream board is really a collection of images that represent something you want to attain in your life.  You list your goals, create mind maps, clip motivational images from magazines, do your own sketches and attach them to a poster board.  Choose a spot for your dream board where you can see it often.  Look at it, internalize it and see your desires manifest.  You can use the same idea to create a learning board for the projects you work on or the most challenging concepts you need to memorize.  Make your learning board visually stimulating to boost your creativity and aid your memory.

Paper place mats.  Forget the napkins, they are not very good to write on anyways.  Use the paper place mats instead.  We adopted this method of note-taking when my husband and I were having a discussion while waiting for our food in a restaurant one day: he took his place mat, turned it over and started making a list.  How about organizing a brainstorming lunch session where people can write on a paper tablecloth while munching on something?  I think it’s more fun than writing on a legal pad.  Besides, new ways of doing things provide good stimulation for the brain.   

For a collection of web note-taking resources, check out Fifty Ways to Take Notes from Solution Watch.

You can design your own customized note-taking sheets at http://www.eleven21.com/notetaker/ or generate your post-it notes at http://www.signgenerator.org/parody/post-it-notes/.

By the way, I started using my cell phone to text message my grocery lists (this way I can send them to my husband for execution).

Forget the words?

People often believe that larger numbers are more authoritative and persuasive.  Yesterday, I came across an example where the opposite was true:  smaller numbers made the story more compelling.  It was a short webmovie form the Miniature Earth project that presented the world’s statistics by reducing the global population to a community of only 100 people. The information was delivered in a brain-friendly way.  We understand what a “million” is, but few of us have actually experienced a “million,” whereas most of us have been around a hundred people at some time.  We comprehend things better when we can connect them to something that we have experienced.  So, next time, you make a presentation to your client or prepare a closing statement for the jury, ask yourself: “How can I appeal to the experiences of my audience?”

Speaking of effective communication, do you know the feeling when you want to express an idea but the right word just escapes you?  Welcome to the OneLook dictionary search and its reverse dictionary feature.  It allows you to describe a concept in a few words, a sentence, or a question and get back a list of related terms.  For example, you type in “being tried twice for the same crime,” and the dictionary search engine creates a list with the first item being “double jeopardy.”  The first terms on the list are supposed to be the best matches.  Using this feature, you can generate a list of related concepts and even solve crossword puzzles by typing in some letters and wildcards.

Last but not least, I’d like to thank the Legal Writing Prof Blog for featuring Lawsagna in its yesterday’s post.  We’ll keep our quills sharpened, keyboards dusted and stay tuned to the latest news in the legal writing field. 

The Avatar Goes To Class

While law schools debate the use and misuse of computers in the classrooms (see Computers in Class from the Law Career Blog for the arguments on both sides and links to more commentary and discussions), some law students send their avatars to class and let them IM / text chat all they want.  This educational milestone became possible due to the CyberOne:  Law in the Court of Public Opinion course, offered by Harvard Law School and partially taught in a 3D virtual environment called Second Life.   The course materials are freely available to the public at the CyberOne website.  (Try to solve The Riddle of Three Hats, which was one of their assignments, you don’t need to be in Second Life for that.) I’ve been reading about the developments at the video vidi visum: virtual blog, and it’s been quiet fascinating.  For those interested in the use of Second Life in education, E-Content has some additional links to the resources on the topic.   All this makes me wonder what law schools will be like ten years from now.  What do you think?  

Branch out: mind-mapping

Mind-mapping is a creative technique to organize information, highlight the key elements and link related concepts in a treelike fashion.  It is more visual and less restrictive than the traditional outlining format.  The graphic representation of a mind map activates both sides of the brain and helps to remember more effectively.  (For more information on mind-mapping, read The Mind Map Book by Tony Buzan and Barry Buzan). 

Mind-mapping can be easily used to supplement outlines or to create additional study aids. Below you can see how I mind-mapped the concept of adverse possession.  The mind map includes a hypothetical to introduce the relevant fact pattern to the right of the main node, the mnemonic for the elements that need to be satisfied, as well as the pictures to anchor these elements.

To create this example, I used a free mind-mapping software written in Java, appropriately called FreeMind.  If you don’t want to download any software, you can go to the Mayomi website that allows you to create a mind map on the site after registering. It can be useful if you work in a computer lab, for example.

To learn about various Web 2.0 sites that can help law students in their learning pursuits, read the Top Law Student blog.